Thursday, July 31, 2014

Teamster NewsConsumer Watchdog Campaign: Teamsters, Transit Workers Back Prop 46 Campaign To Protect Patient Safety Insurance News ...Two powerful labor groups, the California Teamsters Public Affairs Council and the California Conference Board-Amalgamated Transit Union, have joined the growing list of organizations and individuals that support Proposition 46, the patient safety initiative on California's Nov. 4 ballot...Police Union Endorses Lake County Sheriff’s Challenger, Jason Patt Lake Forester ...The Teamsters Local 700, the union representing corrections officers and supervisors along with lieutenants and sergeants of the Lake County Sheriff’s Highway Patrol Division, has endorsed the sheriff’s opponent in the upcoming election...Teamsters Applaud Putnam County Decision To Reject Republic Services’ Florida Landfill Bid teamster.org ...The Teamsters Union is lauding the Putnam County (Fla.) Board of Commissioners today on its decision to reject Republic Services’ [NYSE: RSG] bid to buy the Putnam County landfill...IKEA Canada To Pay Damages To The Teamsters Union teamster.org ...The British Columbia Labour Relations Board … concluded that Ikea violated the law when it negotiated directly with workers and offered to all workers who accepted to cross the picket line better working conditions (including a $2.50 an hour premium and a $500 bonus) than the working conditions that it had offered to the Teamsters at the bargaining table...NLRB Reviews Local Teamster Petition to Expand Definition of 'Dual Employer' National Legal and Policy Center ...When does being employed by a contractor also mean being employed by the corporation with which it contracts? The National Labor Relations Board currently is reviewing this issue in a potential landmark case. If the board rules in favor of a Teamsters local, unions everywhere could have a powerful organizing weapon...LA Unified reaches agreement with principals, police, teamsters LA School Report ...Teamsters Local 572, whose members include school administrative assistants, cafeteria managers, area operations supervisors and bus supervisors approved a similar contract with a bonus payment for the last year...State BattlesChris Christie Pension Cuts Could Damage Economy: Report International Business Times ...when combined with private pension benefits, the spending generated by the national retirement system supports more than 6 million jobs: 4.4 percent of the total national workforce. The report also says that the economic multiplier effect from retirees spending their pension benefits generates $135 billion a year in federal, state and local tax revenues...N.J. Unions Update Lawsuits To Block Christie's Pension Cuts Newark Star-Ledger ...More than a dozen public-worker unions have updated their lawsuits aiming to stop Gov. Chris Christie from slashing scheduled payments to New Jersey's pension system for government employees...In Kansas, Brownback tried a red-state ‘experiment.’ Now he may be paying a political price Washington Post ...Advised by Arthur Laffer, the father of supply-side economics, and supported by special interest groups backed by conservative billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, he pushed through legislation that cut taxes and spending, eliminated state jobs and denied far more applications for welfare assistance...The Republican Occupation of Detroit Daily Beast ...City agencies and entire school districts have been outsourced or privatized; public employees have been laid off in droves; municipalities have sold off vast swaths of public land; and city employee unions have seen their contracts whittled down to nothing...Cargill to close Milwaukee beef facility, cut 600 jobs Milwaukee Journal Sentinel ..."It is unfortunate that we must close any beef plant because of the impact to good people, their families and the community...Democratic Assembly Candidates In Northern Wisconsin Say Act 10 Has Caused ‘Teacher Flight' Wisconsin Public Radio ...Gov. Scott Walker’s Act 10 law, saying it’s causing teachers to leave the state. When Walker pushed Act 10 through the Legislature in his first few months as governor in 2011, he called it a tool for local governments and school boards to balance budgets because it took away almost all union bargaining power...Sick Leave Policies Pick Up Steam CNN Money ...the San Diego city council was one of two cities -- the other being Eugene, Ore. -- to pass new laws mandating paid sick leave on Monday...War On WorkersEmployees’ Pay in U.S. Is Smaller Slice of Income Pie Bloomberg ...Worker pay was a smaller piece of the U.S. income pie than earlier estimated as some Americans collected significantly more in interest and dividend payments over the past two years...White Collar Wage Theft Is Trending: Companies Using Jail And Illegal Arrangements To Prevent Employees From Leaving Forbes ...white collar occupations such as engineers and developers are facing intricate wage theft schemes that are obfuscated by backroom deals and threats of criminal prosecution on a national scale...A Bill to Get the Labor Movement Back on Offense The Nation ...The Ellison-Lewis legislation would amend the National Labor Relations Act to include protections found under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act to include labor organizing as a fundamental right. That would give workers a broader range of legal options if they feel discriminated against for trying to form a union...Banks Cash In On Inversion Deals Intended To Elude Taxes New York Times ...Investment banks are estimated to have collected, or will soon collect, nearly $1 billion in fees over the last three years advising and persuading American companies to move the address of their headquarters abroad (without actually moving)...The Charter School Profiteers Jacobin ...When we welcome schools that lack democratic accountability (charter school boards are appointed, not elected), when we allow public dollars to be used by those with a bottom line (such as the for-profit management companies that proliferate in Michigan), we open doors for opportunism and corruption...Construction Worker Killed At FSU Construction Site Tallahassee Democrat ...A 25-year-old construction worker was killed Monday afternoon in a construction elevator accident on Florida State University campus, said Major Jim Russell, Florida State University Police Department spokesman...Higher Minimum Wage, Faster Job Creation (opinion) New York Times ...The minimum wage has been raised many times without hurting employment...MiscellaneousWall Street Analysts Predict The Slow Demise Of Walmart And Target Huffington Post ...Shoppers are increasingly turning to the web or to smaller, more conveniently located stores, cutting into the market share of big-box retailers like Walmart and Target, the analysts wrote...

Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Shouldn't federal law protect people for trying to organize -- just as it protects them from discrimination because of their race, religion, sex or national origin? Alex Paz thinks so. He's a port truck driver at LA/Long Beach who got fired for complaining that he was misclassified as an independent contractor.

Today Alex joined U.S. Reps. John Lewis and Keith Ellison at a Capitol Hill news conference. The two congressmen announced they filed a bill to make labor organizing a civil right.

Their bill would change the National Labor Relations Act so it protects workers who ask for better wages or working conditions. George Zornick at The Nation explains:

The Ellison-Lewis legislation would amend the National Labor Relations Act to include protections found under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act to include labor organizing as a fundamental right. That would give workers a broader range of legal options if they feel discriminated against for trying to form a union.

Currently, their only redress is through a grievance with the National Labor Relations Board—an important process, but one that workers and labor analysts frequently criticize as both too slow and often too lenient on offending employers.

If the NLRA were amended, however, after 180 days a worker could take his or her labor complaint from the NLRB to a federal court. This is how the law works now for civil rights complaints, which gives workers the option, after 180 days, to step outside the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission process.

Then, workers would have sole discretion on whether to push a complaint, as opposed to relying on a decision by the NLRB on whether to forge ahead. Workers could also move the process along much faster than the NLRB handles complaints, which can often take years.

Alex with Civil Rights icon John Lewis today.

Alex Paz's story shows why workers' rights should be more than the right to hope they don't get fired. He drove for TTSI in Rancho Dominguez, Calif. The truck he drove belonged to TTSI and it was registered to TTSI, but Alex had to pay for registering it. He also had to pay for insurance, fees, fuel, maintenance and tires. His costs amounted to $3,500 a month, leaving him with minimum wage for his work.

TTSI got away with it by calling him an independent contractor. "There was nothing independent in what I do," Alex said.

In June 2013, Alex complained to the California Labor Commissioner that TTSI misclassified him to avoid paying taxes and treating him as an employee. TTSI then sued him. He was served with papers on Christmas Eve. Alex then led the strike in April against Port of LA/Long Beach employers, including TTSI. In May, the Labor Commission held a hearing on his complaint. The company president showed up. Alex was fired four days after telling labor commissioners about the TTSI's scam.

"These companies are getting out of control," he said. "They used ruthless tactics to scare us, but we're not going to back down. I urge other port drivers to join us. Come along and join us in the fight."

If the Ellison-Lewis bill becomes law, the port drivers will have a powerful new tool in their arsenal.

Teamster NewsFired McKesson Worker Fights CEO Hammergren's Potential Exit Pay Bloomberg ...McKesson, which distributes pharmaceuticals and medical products, has agreed to pay Hammergren $292 million in severance if the San Francisco-based company were sold and he lost his job in the process. About $114 million of that is pension pay while $140.6 million is unvested restricted stock and options that would become immediately payable in the event of a change in control and Hammergren’s termination...Port Of Poulsbo Employees Unionize, Begin Contract Negotiation North Kitsap Herald ...Port of Poulsbo employees have unionized and are in labor-contract negotiations with the port district. Port employees voted to unionize and join Teamsters Local 589 on June 2...Massachusetts Charter School Teachers Join Teamsters Local 170 teamster.org ...Teachers in Massachusetts made history recently when they became the first group of charter school teachers to join the Teamsters Union...Wheels On Sun Tran To Keep Going Around, At Least For Another Week Tucson Sentinel ...Tucson's municipal bus system will continue normal operations until at least Aug. 6, as officials with Sun Tran and Teamsters Local 104 agreed to extend the current labor contract for a week. The agreement was set to expire on Thursday, but drivers will avoid a strike — at least for the moment...TradeThe TTIP Threat To Locally-Sourced Food The London Economic ...when deliberations are completed, the controversial TTIP is expected to bypass national judiciaries, encourage deregulation, liberalise almost every public service and get rid of supposed ‘barriers to investment’, which the World Development Movement (WDM) describes as “environmental protection, workers’ rights legislation and food safety standards”...USTR Tells Press that TPP Negotiators Are Down to “A Dozen Issues,” While House Republicans Threaten to Withhold Support infojustice.org ...Inside US Trade reports that U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman told reporters Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiators are “down to a dozen issues” in the intellectual property chapter. However, these are among the most difficult issues remaining...State BattlesFlorida Republicans Are Taking Secret Trips On Big Sugar And No One Will Talk About It Huffington Post ...(Florida Gov. Rick) Scott, along with several other prominent Florida Republicans over the past three years, have traveled to a hunting lodge in Texas owned by industry giant U.S. Sugar. The lodge is located at King Ranch, one of the largest ranches in Texas and itself a stakeholder in several sugar-related businesses...Pence stands by right-to-work law NWI Times ...Gov. Mike Pence is not giving up on the state's right-to-work law, even though two Lake County judges have ruled it incompatible with the Indiana Constitution...August Primary Will Be First Wisconsin Election With Limited Early Voting Wisconsin Public Radio ...Early in-person absentee voting begins on Monday for Wisconsin's Aug. 12 partisan primary, but for the first time it won't be available on the weekend. This will be the state's first election since Gov. Scott Walker signed a law that ended weekend voting and restricted early voting to weekdays between 8 a.m. and 7 p.m... Judge: Mercedes-Benz violated organizing rights in Alabama Detroit News ...An administrative judge said Mercedes-Benz USA violated the rights of workers at its Vance, Ala., plant who were seeking to convince other employees to form a union during off-time, but ruled in the company’s favor in other points of contention and imposed no fines...NC Budget Hole Grows Based On New Tax Cut Analysis WPTF ...North Carolina income tax collections for 2014 are expected to fall $205 million short of earlier projections following Republican-backed tax cuts approved last year...S.F. Supervisor Wants 'Bill Of Rights' For Chain Store Retail Workers San Francisco Business Times ...San Francisco Supervisor Eric Mar will introduce legislation tomorrow to mandate more predictable work schedules for retail workers and require chain stores to offer additional work hours to part-time employees before hiring new or temporary workers...San Diego Approves $11.50 Minimum Wage Huffington Post ...The San Diego City Council gave formal approval on Monday to an ordinance that would incrementally raise the minimum wage in California's second-largest city to $11.50 an hour by January 2017, mostly for workers in the restaurant and retail sectors...War On WorkersMcDonald's Could Be Liable for Labor Practices Associated Press ...The National Labor Relations Board said Tuesday that the world's biggest hamburger chain could be named as a joint employer in several complaints regarding worker rights at franchise-owned restaurants. The decision is pivotal because it could expose McDonald's Corp. to liability for management practices in those locations...Delinquent Debt in America Urban Institute ...Roughly 77 million Americans, or 35 percent of adults with a credit file, have a report of debt in collections. These adults owe an average of $5,178 (median $1,349)...MiscellaneousReshad Chakari, Uber Driver, Arrested For D.C. Sexual Assault Charge WJLA ...District of Columbia police say detectives have arrested a man after a woman reported an Uber car service driver had sexually assaulted her...

Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Teamster NewsAEI Teamsters Overwhelmingly Approve National Agreement teamster.org ...Teamsters working at AEI/Danzas across the country overwhelmingly approved the new tentative National Master Agreement. Likewise, all but two of the supplements were approved by the affected membership...Avis Shuttle Drivers Join Teamsters Local 839 teamster.org ...The unit of 12 drivers came together to win the same benefits enjoyed by their Teamster coworkers who are Avis customer service staff and car washers...TradeWith TTIP Consumer Protection Will Be A Privilege Of The Rich RT ...For some time now civil society and environmental organizations have been raising concerns over whether genetically-modified food will be labeled appropriately; whether antibiotics will be allowed in our food; or, whether chlorine-rinsed chicken will find its way onto Europe’s domestic market. Surprise! Surprise! Nowhere does the document address these...State BattlesU.S. Labor Dept: Wisconsin Again Ranked #1 in Workers Lost Due To Outsourcing Uppity Wisconsin ...For the third year in a row, Wisconsin takes home the dubious crown of the nation's biggest per-capita outsourcer...A Look At Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback's Economic Claims McClatchy DC ...A casual listener - or voter - might conclude that Brownback faced a $500 million budget shortfall in June 2011, six months after he took office. He did not...ALEC Agenda in Dallas: Evisceration of Medicaid, School Privatization and Expansion of Gas Exports Center for Media and Democracy ...Also at this year's meeting, ALEC's task forces will consider bills to make it virtually impossible to enroll in Medicaid, expand charter schools to further bankrupt traditional public schools, expand exports of "natural gas" from fracking, and undermine the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Clean Air and Clean Water Act regulations...Another Ohio City To Layoff Fire Fighters. Thanks John Kasich! Plunderbund ...Butler County has lost $31.6 million in local government funding thanks to Governor John Kasich’s budgets. Warren County lost $15.2 million. In Middletown, these cuts left the city struggling to find enough funding to pay for proper police and fire protection...Thousands of disabled workers in Pa. paid far below minimum wage Daily Times ...About 13,000 disabled Pennsylvanians are earning an average of $2.40 an hour in a legal use of subminimum wages...Unions gaining power in Mass. Boston Globe ...Among the victories unions are savoring: the highest minimum wage in the nation, new workplace protections for state employees, a bill of rights for housekeepers and other domestic workers, limits on nurse-to-patient ratios in intensive care units, and, nearing passage, a $1 billion expansion of the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center...Unions ready to fight Christie pension system plan ABC 27 ...the Democrats who control the Legislature and their union allies say they aren't interested in hearing proposals from Christie after he unilaterally cut the state's contributions to pension funds for the last two fiscal years...Monsanto Ordered To Pay $93 Million For Poisoning People Axis Of Logic ...The West Virginia State Supreme Court finalized a big blow to the biotech giant Monsanto this month, finishing a settlement causing Monsanto to pay $93 million to the tiny town of Nitro, West Virginia for poisoning citizens with Agent Orange chemicals...Right to work makes city look cheap, ruthless (opinion) Fort Wayne Journal Gazette ...I would rather that my city employees are well paid, that they can come to address issues and concerns as required and that they’re professionals we pay to do a job for us...Right To Work Not Decreasing Union Membership Indiana Public Radio ...Two years after Indiana became a right-to-work state, the membership decline unions feared hasn‘t happened. Unionization slipped from one in nine Hoosier workers in 2011 to one out of 11 in 2012, when right-to-work took effect. But union membership had been sliding for years before that, and in the first full year of right-to-work, membership actually rebounded by two-tenths of a percent...Seattle City Council Appeals To Bezos Over Subcontracted Amazon Security Bloomberg Businessweek ...Seattle’s nine city council members declared themselves “deeply concerned” over alleged mistreatment of subcontracted security workers who patrol the company’s headquarters there...War On WorkersThis Congressman Wants To Give You The Right To Sue Union Busters Huffington Post ...If your boss tramples on your right to organize in the workplace, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) believes you should be able to sue for damages in federal court...Fast-Food Workers Intensify Fight For $15 An Hour New York Times ...In its most recent strike in mid-May, workers walked out at restaurants in 150 cities nationwide, with solidarity protests held in 30 countries. The focus increasingly includes unionizing; the movement’s motto has become “$15 and a union.”...Market Basket Workers Violated Some Workers' Rights Lawsuit Says Boston Globe ...The management team of the much-loved supermarket president, whose recent firing has inspired a massive uprising of employees demanding his return, violated the law by locking in workers overnight and requiring them to take unpaid breaks, according to two former employees who are suing the company...Obama Could Curb Corporate 'Inversions' On His Own: Ex-U.S. Official Reuters ...By invoking a 1969 tax law, Obama could bypass congressional gridlock and restrict foreign tax-domiciled U.S companies from using inter-company loans and interest deductions to cut their U.S. tax bills, said Stephen Shay, former deputy assistant Treasury secretary for international tax affairs in the Obama administration...MiscellaneousFAA Proposes to Fine Southwest Airlines $12M Associated Press ...The Federal Aviation Administration said Monday it is proposing a $12 million civil fine against Southwest Airlines for failing to comply with safety regulations related to repairs on Boeing 737 jetliners...

Monday, July 28, 2014

TradeReport: Germany To Reject EU-Canada Trade Deal Globe and Mail ...Germany is to reject a multi-billion free trade deal between the European Union and Canada which is widely seen as a template for a bigger agreement with the United States, a leading German paper reported on Saturday. Citing diplomats in Brussels, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung said Berlin objects to clauses outlining the legal protection offered to firms investing in the 28-member bloc. Critics say they could allow investors to stop or reverse laws...Apocalypse Preview: Chinese River Turns Blood-Red zero hedge ...An inner city waterway in the eastern city of Wenzhou was found to have been inundated by an influx of blood-red water this morning...The Factory in the China Food Scandal Is Foreign-Owned. That Could Have Made It a Target Time ...An undercover investigation by a Chinese TV station, which aired on Sunday, claimed that a factory in Shanghai owned by Illinois-based OSI Group was shipping the fast-food giants expired meat. Later, coffee-shop chain Starbucks in China and McDonald’s outlets in Japan got dragged into the mess, as they, too, had meat from the suspect factory in their products...State BattlesOhio Has Lost 25,000 Local Government Jobs Under John Kasich Plunderbund ...Ohio has seen “nearly 25,000 jobs lost in local government” since John Kasich has been governor of Ohio. And “median incomes in Ohio have fallen about $7,000 over the past decade...”City seeks $2M from unions Racine Journal Times ...Looking for help to close a projected a $4.6 million deficit next year, administration officials at City Hall are seeking $2 million in concessions from police and fire unions...War on WorkersSteel jobs have plummeted by a third since 2000 NWI Times ...Northwest Indiana's steel industry, which once drew immigrants from the world over and put bread on many tables for generations, has lost a third of its jobs since 2000...Corporate Artful Dodgers (opinion) New York Times ...The federal government still gets a tenth of its revenue from corporate profits taxation. But it used to get a lot more — a third of revenue came from profits taxes in the early 1950s, a quarter or more well into the 1960s...World of Resistance Report: IMF, World Bank, Giant Consultants Admit the Storm is Coming truthout ...three issues are prevalent in terms of assessing the fears and threats facing the global elite: 1) growing inequality, 2) decline of public trust in institutions of all kinds, and 3) the resulting social unrest...Financial Predators Move On From Foreclosure Rescue, Enter Student Debt, Military Lending Spaces naked capitalism ... These scams are basically all the same: empty promises about obtaining a modification in exchange for up-front cash, with all the promises broken down the road. In this case, the offending parties happen to be law firms, who made the impression on the victims that they would provide legal representation in securing a modification...Mike Mathieu: Big Data is Watching You Next New Deal ...In a darker turn, we begin to see a loss of human freedoms as behavior is increasingly predicted, tracked, and incentivized according to data models...NSA Helps Crush Dissent at Home and Abroad Washington Blog ...The National Security Agency last year significantly expanded its cooperative relationship with the Saudi Ministry of Interior, one of the world’s most repressive and abusive government agencies. An April 2013 top secret memo provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden details the agency’s plans “to provide direct analytic and technical support” to the Saudis on “internal security” matters...Auto shop worker killed when car falls on him WIVB ...The accident happened Friday afternoon at Yuya Complete Auto Repair on Skillen Street in Buffalo...MiscellaneousOutside money drives a deluge of political ads New York Times ... An explosion of spending on political advertising on television — set to break $2 billion in congressional races, with overall spots up nearly 70 percent since the 2010 midterm election — is accelerating the rise of moneyed interests and wresting control from the candidates’ own efforts to reach voters...

Sunday, July 27, 2014

TradeGOP congressman rips Chamber of Commerce and gives back award Washington Post ...The Chamber of Commerce is beholden to special interests and has long since forgotten the main street businesses that struggle everyday to make payroll and keep their company afloat,” said Bentivolio. “It is with great pride that I reject their award, and call on them to stand on the side of America, instead of on the side of China and corporate interests seeking to exploit people for profit....”State BattlesALEC Picked Up Tab for Texas Lawmakers' Junkets Common Cause ...Five Texas lawmakers have accepted more than $7,600 in corporate-funded “scholarships” to cover the cost of air fares, hotel rooms and other travel expenses to attend meetings of the American Legislative Exchange Council, (ALEC), a corporate lobbying group, according to new research by Common Cause...Right-to-work may get new life next year WMUR ...Right-to-work, a measure that allows workers to get union benefits without joining or paying dues, could come up again in the Legislature next session, depending on what happens in the November elections...Ohio tries to diffuse controversy over charter-school whistle-blowers Akron Beacon Journal ...he four former teachers, who worked at Horizon Science Academy Dayton from 2004 to 2013, alleged at the July 15 state school board meeting that sexual games were played by students and condoned by other educators, and surveillance footage captured students having oral sex at a school function...Koch brothers’ new racial gambit: What’s really behind a quiet battle with AFSCME Salon ...“The Koch brothers want a government-free society,” Saunders says. “Public service has enabled African-Americans to move into the middle class, but the Kochs are trying to dismantle that...”State to pay nearly $1.7 million to identify buildings to sell Milwaukee Journal Sentinel ...The idea has been controversial, with critics saying they fear the state could make a short-term gain but a long-term loss. They fear getting rid of the heating and cooling plants could be costly because state prisons and University of Wisconsin campuses would have buy heating and cooling on the private market...War on WorkersFederal regulators let utilities gouge customers David Cay Johnston ...Now the first in a raft of cases asserting that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is letting utilities gouge customers by setting egregiously high rates of return may finally get a hearing...Private Equity's Free Pass New York Times ...But while private equity firms often operate like Goldman and Morgan Stanley, they are not uniformly subject to the same broker-dealer regulatory regime...The Typical Household, Now Worth a Third Less New York Times ...The inflation-adjusted net worth for the typical household was $87,992 in 2003. Ten years later, it was only $56,335, or a 36 percent decline, according to a study financed by the Russell Sage Foundation...NLRB ruling further expands 'micro unions' Washington Examiner ...In a case involving a Macy's department store cosmetics counter, the National Labor Relations Board on Tuesday further expanded its recent precedents allowing for so-called "micro-unions." The ruling will make it easier for unions to organize individual parts of an employer's workforce...WHY THE ECONOMY SUCKS: Because American Companies And Their Owners Are Greedier Now Than At Any Time In History Business Insider ...Five years after the recovery began, unemployment remains high. And the Americans who are lucky enough to be working are getting paid less as a percent of the economy than they ever have in history. Meanwhile, America's corporations and their owners have never had it better...

Saturday, July 26, 2014

Teamster NewsTeamsters Win Settlement For Taxi Driver Barred From Speaking At Public Meeting IBT ...Teamsters Local 922 scored a major victory for a D.C. taxi driver who will receive a monetary settlement as part of an agreement reached with the city after he was barred from speaking at a D.C. Taxi Commission (DCTC) meeting over concerns that his accent made him difficult to understand...Hinckley Springs Employees Are Back At Work After 25-Day Strike Des Plaines Valley News ...Teamsters union members at the Hinckley Springs water bottling plant at 6055 S. Harlem Ave. in Chicago ended their 25-day strike on July 17. ...the workers felt the offer presented by DS Services of America Inc., which owns and operates the Hinckley Springs plants, was the best under the circumstances...TradeGerman NGO Says TTIP Will Undermine Global Food Security EurActiv ...The planned Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) between the EU and the US threatens the concept of sustainable food security, the development NGO Brot für die Welt announced at a presentation of its annual report, in Berlin...Ethiopia Becomes China’s China In Global Search For Cheap Labor Bloomberg News ...Huajian is nonetheless becoming a case study of Ethiopia’s emerging potential as a production center for labor-intensive products from shoes to T-shirts to handbags....State BattlesGovernor Rick Scott Shows What A Real Scandal Looks Like Time Magazine ...There’s nothing inherently wrong with government support for a train linking Miami and Orlando ... but it looks pretty sketchy after Governor Scott (at the urging of his conflicted chief of staff) rejected $2.4 billion in federal money for a high-speed rail project that would have eventually linked Miami, Orlando and Tampa. ...WEDC to hold its board meeting at China outsourcer Jake's Economic TA Funhouse ...Here's more on the absurdity of Gov Walker's quickly-backfiring ads against Trek bicycle. Walker's pet "jobs creator" organization, the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC), has its next Board meeting on Monday, and it's located at the headquarters of Briggs and Stratton Corporation in Wauwatosa... On the stump, Hanaway calls for ‘right to work’, eliminating state income tax, and tort reform PoliticM ...Hanaway is the only announced Republican candidate for (Missouri) governor in 2016...War On Workers40-hour workweek just a memory, survey finds South Bend Tribune ...The "Take Back 60" study found that 88 percent of the 617 respondents who took the online survey last month said they work more than 40 hours a week...Construction Worker On Fort Bragg Killed When Trench Caves In Fayetteville Observer ...Federal labor investigators are working to determine how a trench on Fort Bragg collapsed, killing a man Thursday morning...Fired Walmart CEO to Get $4.5 Million To Leave Job 2 Paragraphs ...Walmart also suffers from some PR problems, given its much publicized low-wage workforce, an unsightly percentage of whom are also using government-funded food stamps to sustain themselves...At 3 Years Old, The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Gives Americans A Soapbox Huffington Post ...Despite vehement opposition, the CFPB continues to build on a solid track record that to date includes winning $4.6 billion in damages for 15 million consumers harmed by illegal practices. Included in that figure are major accomplishments, like forcing credit card companies to return $1.5 billion to consumers duped by add-on products and changing lending rules to ensure loans can and will be paid back so there will never again be a repeat of the Great Meltdown of 2008. The agency has also started the arduous process of taking entities that offer predatory student loans to the mat in court...MiscellaneousSenator’s Bill Is Stricter On N.S.A. Than House’s ...Senator Patrick J. Leahy said Thursday that next week he would file a new version of a bill aimed at ending the National Security Agency’s bulk phone records collection program after extensive negotiations with the Obama administration and privacy groups...

Friday, July 25, 2014

Teamster NewsUnion Official: GET Board Rejects Offer, Strike To Continue KBFX ...Union drivers, mechanics and other support staff went on strike July 15, unhappy with pay and the part-time status of more than half of their GET drivers. The union was asking for a 4 percent wage increase every year over a three-year deal...Latino Express Bus Drivers Still Fighting For Rights In Chicago teamster.org ...For more than three years, Teamsters Local 777 has continued to fight for approximately 100 school bus drivers in Chicago who want nothing more than fair working conditions...Teamsters Grievance Prompts Cook County Sheriff to Conduct Manpower Study teamster.org ... Teamsters Local 700, Cook County's largest public employee union, has learned the Sheriff's Office has enlisted college-age interns to oversee a critical new study on manpower shortages facing the department...TradeAdministration Plans Orwellian Statistics Fudge to Make Offshored Production Look Like US Made naked capitalism ...If the factoryless goods proposal were to be implemented, the value of U.S. brand-name products made outside of the United States and imported here would be counted as manufacturing “services” imports, not imported goods...State BattlesSeattle Minimum Wage Referendum Effort Fails Daily Caller ...Forward Seattle, a group which represents local businesses in Seattle, announced Wednesday that they failed to collect enough signatures to subject the city’s $15 minimum wage to a November vote...Recent Report Points To Job Growth Despite Minimum Wage Increase Oakland Press ...New data released by the Department of Labor points toward job growth in states that have raised the minimum wage, something still being debated in Michigan...Republican lawmakers push 'paycheck protection' in Pa. Pocono Record ...Republican supporters of so-called "paycheck protection" legislation moved bills in both houses last week that would prevent government employee unions, such as the Service Employees International Union and the Pennsylvania State Education Association from deducting union dues and political contributions from members' checks...Davis And State Dems Planning To Monitor For Voter Suppression, Discrimination Texas Public Radio ...Democratic gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis and the Texas Democratic Party are launching a voter protection program to monitor voter suppression and discrimination on Election Day...Christie: Public workers' benefits must be cut Asbury Park Press ...It was the first time Gov. Chris Christie had come to any event in Republican-red Ocean County where the protesters outnumbered his supporters. And these were not just ordinary protesters — they were police officers and firefighters in the hundreds from all over New Jersey, outraged that Christie on Tuesday had come to use a municipal park their fraternal brothers and sisters had built for local children...War On WorkersThe Pay-For-Performance Myth Bloomberg Businessweek ...The trend line—the average of how much a CEO’s ranking is affected by stock performance—shows that a CEO’s income ranking is only 1 percent based on the company’s stock return. That means that 99 percent of the ranking has nothing to do with performance at all. (The size and profitability of companies didn’t affect the random patterns.)...Obama Seeks to Close Loophole That Firms Use to Shield Profits Abroad New York Times ...President Obama on Thursday called for Congress to strip away tax advantages that have encouraged a rush of mergers and acquisitions that give companies an overseas base while they maintain their presence in the United States...IMF Cuts US and Global Growth Forecasts for 2014 Associated Press ...The International Monetary Fund foresees the global economy expanding less than it had previously forecast, slowed by weaker growth in the United States, Russia and developing economies...Koch High: How The Koch Brothers Are Buying Their Way Into The Minds Of Public School Students Huffington Post ...The official mission of Youth Entrepreneurs is to provide kids with "business and entrepreneurial education and experiences that help them prosper and become contributing members of society." The underlying goal of the program, however, is to impart Koch's radical free-market ideology to teenagers. In the last school year, the class reached more than 1,000 students across Kansas and Missouri...Norfolk Southern sues to block disclosure of crude oil shipments McClatchy ...A major hauler of crude oil by rail has sued the state of Maryland to stop the public release of information about the shipments, according to court documents...Stability Is Good For Employees And Bosses (opinion) New York Times ...Unpredictable, unstable work hours, over which workers may have little control, make it difficult for any employee, at any level of income, to combine or schedule caregiving for family members, education, participation in civic and religious organizations or another job...Volatile Schedules Exacerbate Inequality (opinion) New York Times ...Across the economy, workers are either employed for too few hours or far too many in an ever-changing workweek that demands 24/7 availability, without guarantees of equal treatment or employee input...Road Construction Worker Killed In Reno County KAKE ...The Kansas Highway Patrol says a construction worker died after being hit by a trash truck in Reno County...MiscellaneousWalmart U.S. CEO Bill Simon Is Out Huffington Post ...Walmart’s U.S. chief Bill Simon is leaving the company after a rough four years. The 54-year-old will be replaced by Greg Foran, 53, Walmart’s current president and CEO in Asia...

Wednesday, July 23, 2014

The poor widdle Koch brothers. Now people are making fun of them for backing a phony science group, the American Foundation on Science and Health (ACSH). It claims opponents of GMOs are causing blindness around the world (really). It claims e-cigarettes are safe and fracking will lead to energy independence, even as energy companies that frack are pushing to export more liquid natural gas to Russia.

As much as the Koch brothers try to protect their secrecy privacy, people keep insisting on prying into their business. Just the other day the Center for Media and Democracy reported the Kochs' political spending is even more enormous than we thought. It turns out David Koch secretly writes millions of dollars in personal checks to stink tanks that spew propaganda against unions, public education, environmental protection, voting rights and consumer safety.

Now CMD is at it again, making fun of the Kochs for bankrolling the American Foundation on Science and Health. The Kochs profit from petroleum products like ammonia fertilizers and other agribusiness-related operations, so of course they'll pay for a propaganda machine that tells us GMO food is safe. Writes CMD:

ACSH has also published claims about GMOs that make outrageous statements like "opposition to agricultural progress . . . causes blindness and death worldwide." ACSH has also made patently false and easily disprovable claims such as, "[T]here are no alternative technologies available to plant breeders with which new improved varieties can be created to overcome the current limitations of global agriculture to produce sufficient food, feed, fuel, and fiber on available land."

Then there's this on liquid natural gas:

ACSH has published reports calling fracking "a safe and efficient path to energy independence," despite the hazardouschemical cocktail used in hydraulic fracturing, which spoils millions of gallons of fresh drinking water each year. ACSH's spin also ignores the growing amount of "natural gas" fracked in the U.S. that is exported to foreign countries ... Now, the New York Times and other outlets are writing about the strong push by energy companies like Exxon for large quantities of liquid natural gas from fracking to be exported to Russia and elsewhere rather than kept for domestic use.

And surprise! ACSH now says e-cigarettes are safe -- perhaps because it's getting money from e-cigarette makers. The phony science group says "electronic cigarettes should be made as accessible as cigarettes. Electronic cigarettes should be sold widely and lightly regulated..."

No one likes them but their fellow plutocrats. All because they're spending so much money to turn the United States into a feudal serfdom.

Garner was a former SAG 2nd vice president (1960-61), SAG National Board member (1959) and a recipient of the SAG Life Achievement Award.

SAG-AFTRA issued a statement on the death of James Garner:

Garner received the award in 2004 for exemplifying the highest ideals of the acting profession, both in front of the camera and in his philanthropic endeavors. ... Garner dedicated time and resources to showing support for America’s service members and various political causes. He was a veteran of the Korean War and joined Martin Luther King Jr. for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963.

When he received the SAG Life Achievement Award, Garner expressed his appreciation for his fellow actors and his union.

“Actors are very special people, and I love each and every one of you. I have been a member of this guild for over 50 years, and it’s a great guild,” he said. “It’s the best guild in the world. I’m proud to be part of it. And just remember, you take damn good care of it, okay?”

“James Garner was the definition of the smooth, dashing leading man, but his talents were so much more than skin deep. He was a hard worker who dedicated himself wholly to whatever he set out to accomplish, whether it was serving his country or performing for the camera,” said SAG-AFTRA President Ken Howard.

Teamster NewsProtecting Two-Person Crew Is Still Our Goal BLET ...We will continue to work with the National Representatives of SMART’s Transportation Division wherever and whenever in an effort to preserve and protect two-person crews...Chicago Teamsters Will March to Department of Human Rights on July 28 teamster.org ...A Chicago sink manufacturer that’s restricting employees’ time in the bathroom is now refusing to negotiate with unionized workers until they keep quiet about the discriminatory policy...Seattle Teamsters Ratify Contracts With Three Major Grocers IBT ...Hundreds of Teamsters at three grocery warehouses – Safeway, SuperValu, and Unified Grocers – voted overwhelmingly to ratify their contracts over the weekend. The agreements contain annual wage increases and protections against subcontracting and the rising cost of health care...GET Board To Vote On Proposal From Striking Union Bakersfield Californian ...he proposal was put forward by union negotiators during a Friday morning bargaining session between GET and Visalia-based Teamsters Local 517, which represents more than 250 striking GET bus drivers and mechanics...Chesco Human Services Employees Ratify Contract The Mercury ...Unionized employees of the Chester County Department of Human Services have ratified a new contract that will guarantee them annual raises of about 9.25 percent over the next three years combined, according to those involved with negotiations. The contract comes about 15 months after the employees, who serve county residents needing social services, voted to be represented by Teamsters Local 384 ...TradeAdministration Flooded with 26,000 Comments Opposing Proposal to Disguise Offshoring of U.S. Manufacturing Public Citizen ...More than 26,000 people nationwide have submitted comments opposing Obama administration proposals that would severely distort U.S. job and trade data by reclassifying U.S. corporations that offshore American jobs as “factoryless goods” manufacturers...A quarter of McDonald’s restaurants in China may have been serving expired meat Washington Post ... The supplier, Shanghai-based Husi Food Co Ltd, was forced to shut down after local television station Dragon TV (link in Chinese) ran footage of the company's factory workers picking hamburger patties and meat from off the factory floor and throwing them directly into meat mixers, and using bare hands to handle poultry and beef on the assembly line. The footage also showed sewage and trash spread on the floor of the processing plant; in addition, expired meat, which was described as “stinky” by workers themselves, was either concealed by mixing it together with non-expired meat, or simply altering its expiration date...State BattlesTaxi Group Unveils Plan To Boost Fares, Fees To Help Drivers' Plight Chicago Sun-Times ...Mileage and waiting times that drive up Chicago taxicab fares would rise by 25 percent under a 10-point plan proposed Monday to put more money into the pockets of struggling cabbies...Poor Job Growth Still Afflicts Kansas Despite Sam Brownback's Tax Cuts Kansas City Star ...Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback and his advisers want to create an alternate reality when it comes to job growth in the state. They keep throwing out misleading numbers to the public while trying to cloud Kansas’ mediocre jobs picture...War On WorkersBNSF Moves Toward Allowing Trains With Only One Engineer Omaha World-Herald ...BNSF Railway said Monday it has reached a tentative agreement with its largest labor union to permit single engineers to drive trains equipped with a pending new safety system mandated by Congress...City of Austin worker killed in southeast Travis County crash KXAN ...A City of Austin worker was killed following a crash involving an 18-wheeler and a pickup truck on FM 973 just north of Highway 71...Construction Worker Killed In 50-Foot Fall From Ladder Q13Fox ...A construction worker was found dead Monday at Bellevue College after what appeared to be a fall from a ladder around 50 feet above the ground, police said...MiscellaneousImposter Uber Driver Reported In Virginia Highland Area NBC News ...She said when they arrived at her location she could see her friends standing on the sidewalk directly across the street, but the driver refused to let her get out and he quickly drove to another secluded location. She stated he demanded all of her money...Workers At A Subway Sandwich Shop Vote To Unionize Huffington Post ...A group of Subway sandwich makers just proved that it isn't impossible for fast food workers to unionize. Workers at a Subway location in Bloomsbury, N.J., on Friday voted in favor of joining the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. The 13 workers are employed by the Tennessee-based travel center company Pilot Flying J, but they all work inside the company's Subway franchise at the rest stop...

Tuesday, July 22, 2014

If you do something careless or stupid or illegal that costs other people money, you should reimburse them, right?

Even though corporations are people, some of them get away with breaking the law or costing other people money. They destroy the environment and make other people pay for the cleanup, or they pay their workers so little they rely on taxpayer-funded government assistance.

Carl Pope, president of the Sierra Club, once forced a greedy corporation to do the right thing simply by exposing its plans to evade the law.

Pope, writing in EcoWatch, points out that hikers in Sierra County, Calif., have to reimburse the county if they are evacuated by air for a medical emergency. That could cost more than $5,000. A climber air lifted from Yosemites cliffs can easily run $85,000. "But that’s fair—we ought to pay for the costs we create," he wrote.

BP is no different. Nor are the banks, or pharmaceutical companies or automakers. The law sets penalties so low that the corporations shrug them off as the cost of doing business.

Pope explained how it was done in one case. Early in his career, he was slipped a memo about an oil company that had a natural gas field partly in federal waters and therefore subject to federal price controls:

The memo boasted a complex decision tree complete with % estimates of how likely the feds were to discover the liability on their own, what the oil company’s chances of winning in court were (less than half) and finally what were the odds of jail terms for company employees. Each of these had a dollar value attached, and the final conclusion was—don’t report. I shared the leaked document with federal energy regulators. The oil company observed the price controls.

If only more stories about corporate greed had happy endings like that.

Tens of thousands of working people participated in the strike, which began May 16, 1934 and lasted throughout the summer. The Teamsters' strike was one of the main catalysts for the rise of unions in the 1930s. (So were two other strikes, the 1934 West Coast Longshore Strike and the 1934 ToledoAuto-Lite Strike.)

Keegel is a third-generation Teamster who joined the union in 1959 after graduated from high school. And he will tell you, "I love this great union for everything it's done for me and for workers across this country."

The local he joined, Local 574, was the predecessor to his local, Local 544. Keegel got to know truckers who'd been part of the strike, and he got to meet Jimmy Hoffa just after joining. That, he said, set the direction in his life. He became recording secretary and business agent in 1977, secretary-treasurer, joint council president and on March 21, 1999 he took office as general-secretary treasurer of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, along with General President Jim Hoffa.

If you've never heard Tom Keegel speak, watch the video. He was speaking last weekend, at a celebration of the 80th anniversary of the 1934 Teamsters strike. "People were hungry and hard and looking for work," he said. He described how the Dunn brothers and Farrell Dobbs organized 10,000 workers.

"We need to commemorate them and honor them because they had the guts to stand up and take on the fight," Keegel said. Without them, workers wouldn't have health insurance, pensions, holidays or vacations.

"We should never ever take for granted the benefits we have under our Teamster contracts," he said. The anti-union businessmen who lost the strike -- called the Citizens Alliance -- are probably rolling over in their graves because Minneapolis is now one of the best union towns in the country.

As a young Teamster, his steward said to him:

Don't ever forget where you come from, don't ever forget where you're going and by God because you're a union member you got what you got and you need to do that for other people as well.

There's one other thing Tom Keegel said at the end of his speech. If you've ever heard him, you know what it is.

The Teamsters are more than a little annoyed that McKesson CEO John Hammergren stands to take home $616.5 million if the company were sold tomorrow.

Call Hammergren the poster child for inequality. Employees at McKesson's Lakeland, Fla., facility voted to become Teamsters because some of them don't earn enough to afford health care. McKesson's idea of fairness is to try to bust the union while giving its CEO more than a half-billion dollars.

The Teamsters have charged McKesson with illegally busting unions, coercing employees, discriminating against union members and firing a worker for exercising her First Amendment rights.

All the Teamsters want is a fair share of the profit they help produce. To that end, the Teamsters are fighting to curb Hammergren's immoral take-home pay at the company's annual shareholders' meeting. Bloomberg today reported on the Teamsters proposal:

Hammergren’s potential payout under a change in control would include equity awards worth $140.6 million that were set up to vest only over time. They’d be his right away, though, if he were terminated after a sale. The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which calls that kind of pay “unearned compensation for top executives on their way out the door,” has proposed a ballot measure urging McKesson’s board to reduce the accelerated vesting.

While it’s not unusual for unions to challenge CEO pay provisions, the Teamsters’ proposal is endorsed by proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services. It has also drawn support from CtW Investment Group, which represents investors with $250 billion in retirement assets under management, and the New York State Common Retirement Fund, which oversees $160.7 billion in retirement money, according to officials at both organizations.

According to Bloomberg's assessment, Hammergren is doing 'reasonably well':

His $292 million change-in-control severance package, combined with $289 million more in company stock and options he already owns, would bring his total kitty in the event of a termination to $581 million on paper—a figure based on valuations as of March 31. Factor in an 8.8 percent increase in share price since then, and it would come to roughly $616.6 million, according to calculations by Equilar.

TradeTPP risks weaker world trade system - ex WTO boss New Zealand Herald ...The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a step backwards to the days before the World Trade Organisation when the US and Europe controlled the global trading system to the detriment of developing economies, says a former director-general of the WTO, Supachai Panitchpakdi of Thailand...Milk Group Wants EU To Move On GI Issue In TTIP WNAX ...European Union negotiators appear to be holding firm on their insistence for having geographical indicators imposed in the Trans Atlantic Trade And Investment Partnership agreement. G-I’s are common food names such as feta, parmesan or munster that the E.U. wants to have exclusive control of...State BattlesIn N.C., conservative donor Art Pope sits at heart of government he helped transform Washington Post ...From the outside, Pope’s family foundation has put more than $55 million into a robust network of conservative think tanks and advocacy groups, building a state version of what his friends Charles and David Koch have helped create on a national level...Corporate Welfare State: Taxpayers now on the hook for Job Training, while state pushes importing cheaper "Skills Gap" labor! WisDemCurmudgeon ...the President of the Wisconsin Technology Council Tom Still ... (defended) importing cheap foreign labor to fill that mythical "skills gap," but he also bragged those same workers have a "propensity" to start their own businesses. If we lag in jobs created, Still said, it's because we don't have enough foreign workers in Wisconsin...Senate Candidate Gary Peters To Kochs: Come At Me, Bros Huffington Post ..."I feel like l'm not really running against Terri Lynn Land. I feel like I'm running against the Koch brothers," Peters said at a campaign rally in Detroit on Friday...War on WorkersWorker killed after being hit by truck near Sahara and Valley View KTNV ...A 57-year-old man who was working in the road was killed Sunday morning near West Sahara Avenue and Valley View Boulevard (in Las Vegas). The incident happened around 9:44 a.m. Police say the man, who was a subcontractor, was in the bus lane in the 3900 block of Sahara, cutting asphalt with a wet saw...In a Subprime Bubble for Used Cars, Borrowers Pay Sky-High Rates New York Times ...Mr. Durham is one of millions of Americans with shoddy credit who are easily obtaining auto loans from used-car dealers, including some who fabricate or ignore borrowers’ abilities to repay. The loans often come with terms that take advantage of the most desperate, least financially sophisticated customers. The surge in lending and the lack of caution resemble the frenzied subprime mortgage market before its implosion set off the 2008 financial crisis...NYC gives the green light to the building of apartments with a 'poor door' for tenants living in affordable housing Daily Mail ...The City approved a proposal from Extell, a prominent NYC developer, to install a separate door for tenants living in affordable housing units to enter the building...MiscellaneousTrain Derailment Prompts Evacuation in Washington County Associated Press ...A fire official says two people are injured and several thousand gallons of diesel fuel have spilled after a train derailment in the town of Slinger, (Wisc.). Slinger Fire Department Chief Rick Hanke says three engines and 10 railcars derailed Sunday, forcing the evacuation of more than 100 nearby homes...